Unfit to Practice

by Perri O'shaughnessy

  “I wouldn’t know about that.”

  “Did she ever get found in contempt?”

  “I have no way of knowing.”

  “So she attacked the prosecution’s case and got her clients off on the tickets,” Jack mused as if to himself. “Guess that didn’t make her too popular with law enforcement up at Tahoe.”

  “Exactly. She could not be trusted.”

  “It sure didn’t make her very popular with you, did it?”

  “I-I didn’t like her tactics.”

  “You didn’t like her success, you mean. How do you like criminal-defense attorneys in general, from your viewpoint in law enforcement?”

  “They are a necessary ev-they are part of the system.”

  Smiling, Jack said, “They could all get shipped off to Timbuktu and you wouldn’t miss ’em, would you?”

  “Not really.”

  “I appreciate your forthrightness,” Jack said. He had a rhythm going, Nina thought. He wasn’t half bad. A small relief released some of the built-up pressure in her chest.

  “Now, you mentioned that it didn’t help your investigation that Ms. Reilly wouldn’t tell you her clients’ names.”

  “I felt she was not cooperating with the investigation.”

  “Ever heard of Rule 1.6 (a)?”

  “I’m not a lawyer.”

  “Indeed you aren’t. Let me put it this way. Did you know that there is a rule of practice for attorneys that prohibits them from revealing any information relating to the representation of a client unless the client consents after consultation?”

  “Not even the name?”

  “Not even the name.”

  “No. I didn’t know that.”

  “And Ms. Reilly did give you the names as soon as she had talked to her clients?”

  “Yes, but without knowing more about what was in the files we couldn’t tell if the theft might be related to one of the clients.”

  “What about the attorney-client privilege? Ever heard of that?”

  “Yes, but I’m not a lawyer. Like I said.”

  “But it caused you trouble, Ms. Reilly fulfilling her duties as a lawyer?”

  “I’m just saying-”

  “Did she do anything besides protect the confidentiality of the files that caused you a problem?”

  Officer Scholl thought that through. “I felt she was defensive about her relationship with Nicole Zack. I felt that individual was a suspect.”

  “Didn’t you tell her Ms. Zack was bad news, in so many words?”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “And she defended Ms. Zack to you?”

  “She wouldn’t hear a word against her.”

  “Let me ask you this. Did you at any time in your investigation develop a shred of evidence, a scintilla of evidence, that Ms. Zack had anything to do with this theft?”

  “No. But I still-”

  “Now then. You testified that Ms. Reilly is a touchy-feely type who has gone so far as to hug a client in your presence?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “In what circumstances did she do this?”

  “Well, the jury came in.”

  “With a verdict?”

  “Yes.”

  “An acquittal?”

  “Yes.”

  “And they hugged each other?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Do you believe that hugging a client after an acquittal leads to moral turpitude, oh, for example, sleeping with her male clients?”

  “Objection! There’s so much wrong with that question I don’t know where to start,” Nolan said, on her feet.

  “Why, Counsel, isn’t that exactly what you were trying to imply?” Jack said innocently.

  “Rephrase it, Counsel,” Judge Brock said, amusement twitching the corners of his mouth.

  “Well, you know that Ms. Reilly is accused of sleeping with one of South Lake Tahoe’s finest, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you think she gets too intimate with her clients?”

  “She befriends them. She hugs them.”

  “Shocking, isn’t it.”

  “Counsel, let’s move on,” Brock said.

  “Just one last thing. When you found Ms. Reilly’s vehicle, it was full of papers and used coffee cups?”

  “It was pretty trashed.”

  “Do you attribute that to Ms. Reilly’s generally being a trashy person?”

  “What kind of question is that?” Nolan said. “I object. Counsel is making fun of the witness.”

  “She’s calling my client trashy, Your Honor.”

  “Move on.”

  “Was the truck locked when it was found?”

  “No.”

  “Anyone could have had a few Gatorades and left them in the back. The thief could have gotten thirsty while riding around in the stolen vehicle, isn’t that correct?”

  “Correct or incorrect, it’s irrelevant and it’s frivolous,” Nolan said.

  “Anyone could have left that trash,” Jack said. “I feel it’s a relevant point.”

  “Objection sustained,” the judge said.

  “Did you have the Gatorade bottles tested for DNA? Trashy people drink out of the bottle, you know.”

  “We don’t have the resources to go that far for a simple auto theft.”

  “How about the coffee cup?”

  “It looked like it had been there a long time.”

  “You assumed it was Ms. Reilly’s cup?”

  “Well, it seemed to be.”

  “So let’s see if I can summarize your testimony up to this point,” Jack said. “You took the report, you can’t stand Ms. Reilly or criminal-defense lawyers in general, you did a half-assed investigation and got lucky and finally stumbled across the truck, and you think Ms. Reilly must have slept with Kevin Cruz because you saw her hug a female client after an acquittal by a jury?”

  “Objection!”

  “Sustained.”

  “Ever see Ms. Reilly and Officer Cruz together, Officer Scholl?”

  “No,” Officer Scholl said flatly.

  “You’re darn right you haven’t. I have nothing further, Your Honor.”

  “Jack,” Nina whispered after he sat down. “What about the fact that she hates me for making her look like an idiot on the stand? What about the fact that she may have cooked up this whole malicious plot?”

  “Let me ask you a question. Should we rock Brock to sleep with harebrained theories about what happened, or should we try to win this case?”

  21

  G AYLE NOLAN WALKED to the courtroom door and opened it. Stepping inside, she called her next witness. Bruce Ford entered, moving quickly to the stand. His date of birth put him in his late twenties, although he seemed older to Nina. Bristly hair fringed his face, and dark curls were cut tight to his head. Like almost all lawyers, he had to correct his eyes with specs, but these were a hip green-tinted pair. He appeared well ironed into an expensive suit, but not happy to be here.

  She had heard Nolan had twisted his arm to come. He didn’t want to come out publicly against a fellow attorney, although mean-spirited letter-writing was apparently acceptable practice. She shifted in her seat as Ford described his tax practice and educational background.

  Gayle Nolan remained seated as she asked questions, the black notebooks on each side of the table framing her like big guns. Here was the chief trial counsel’s place of power, Nina thought, behind these windowless walls, in this aridity, fighting what she probably considered the good fight, sinking incompetent attorneys.

  Attorneys like her.

  “Mr. Ford, please tell us the circumstances that brought you here today.”

  Bruce Ford took his glasses off and wiped them with a handkerchief, then placed them carefully back on his nose. “My fiancée, Brandy, hired Ms. Reilly as her attorney. She and her sister, Angel Guillaume, were present at South Lake Tahoe’s Campground by the Lake the night that Phoebe Palladino was killed. They had seen something th
at night, somebody running away from the tent Phoebe was in, so they went to ask Ms. Reilly for advice. They needed to talk to the police but were afraid about what would happen if they did. Turns out they were right to worry about that, only they should have been worrying just as much about who they chose to hire.”

  “Shouldn’t you object?” Nina whispered. “He wasn’t even my client and he’s stating opinions.”

  “We want the judge to see we respect his intelligence. He knows opinions differ from fact.”

  “So Ms. Reilly was not specifically your attorney?” Nolan asked Bruce Ford.

  “She was representing my fiancée.”

  “What happened to you after your fiancée consulted Ms. Reilly?”

  “I was in my office one day. A guy bullied his way through my receptionist and into my office. He introduced himself as Cody Stinson, but at the time that meant nothing to me. I didn’t know the name. Well, I see a lot of different types. First, I assumed he was a potential client who was just worked up about something. I get a lot of that. Then he started talking about strangling someone, and I suddenly realized he wasn’t there to consult me about anything.”

  “In your opinion, Mr. Ford, why had he come there?”

  “He was there to threaten and intimidate me.”

  “What was the intimidation designed to accomplish?”

  “He wanted my fiancée to quit talking to anyone about what happened at the campground. He was perfectly clear on that point. He swore she’d be sorry if she didn’t ‘shut her mouth’-only his language was much cruder than mine is here today. He threatened me, said he’d get me if I didn’t do something about her.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “I don’t know how I did it. Years of handling my alcoholic dad, I think. Anyway, I threw him out.”

  “Did he go peaceably?”

  “He broke a porcelain lamp that was on the secretary’s desk.”

  “How did he do that?”

  “Knocked it down. He was yelling. Very angry.”

  “After he left, what did you do?”

  “Moved in with a friend.”

  “Why?”

  “As he was leaving, Stinson taunted me. Said he knew where I lived.”

  “You were frightened?”

  “Very.”

  “Did you tell anyone where you were?”

  “Not for a couple of days.”

  “You didn’t call your fiancée?”

  He stretched his neck uncomfortably. “We were-having a hard time, but I tried to reach her. Didn’t have much luck.”

  “After a few days, you made contact?”

  “She found me. I knew she could if she wanted to badly enough.”

  “What effect did this incident have on your business?”

  “I couldn’t work. I didn’t take calls. It cost me money and made it hard for me to complete the work I had at hand. It had a distinctly negative effect on my business.”

  “And on you personally?”

  “I suffered tremendous emotional distress. I had to see a doctor. It exacerbated the problems with my fiancée.”

  Jack, taking a different tack, stood when he talked to Ford, although he stood behind the table. He moved his weight from one side to the other, his compact body swaying like a tree in a wild wind as he thought on his feet. “Mr. Ford, why didn’t you know about Cody Stinson in the first place?”

  “I hadn’t talked to my fiancée, Brandy Taylor, for a couple of days.”

  “And why was that?”

  “She was out of town.”

  “But you were on speaking terms.”

  “Of course.” But the eyes behind the green tint blinked.

  “Did she later tell you that she had been instructed by her attorney to contact you?”

  “I don’t remember that.”

  “Did she say she tried to reach you before Cody Stinson ever came to your office to tell you what was going on?”

  Ford had a toothache, judging from the tortured crook to his mouth. “Yes.”

  “Why couldn’t she reach you to warn you?”

  “My cell phone was out.”

  “Why couldn’t she find you at the office?”

  “She left some messages,” he admitted. “I was upset. I didn’t call her back. Believe me, I regret that very much now. I was wrong.”

  “Mr. Ford, isn’t it true that you moved in with your friend several days before Cody Stinson showed up at your office?”

  He was silent.

  Busted, Nina thought. Jack hadn’t told her about that.

  “You were having some problems in your relationship and moved out. You weren’t taking calls from your fiancée at home or at the office, isn’t that so, Mr. Ford?”

  The tongue went back to work the bad molar again. “I’m not proud of how I behaved. I hate fighting with her. I guess the timing of the whole thing got confused in my mind,” he said.

  “I guess it did, Mr. Ford. So any harm to your business, aside from a lamp that may have been broken accidentally, is really due to the problems you were having in your relationship, isn’t it?”

  “Listen, that guy scared me. He threw me off my stride. He threatened my fiancée! He had no business doing that. She was scared to death. I felt so horrible when I found out.”

  Ford didn’t come off too badly, just as a protective boyfriend, but his indignation no longer carried the heft of righteousness. The judge lost interest. He turned toward the clerk and said something. The clerk nodded, then focused harder on the mysteries unfolding on her computer.

  “How did you know about that?” Nina whispered to Jack.

  “I read it in his eyes.”

  “You did?”

  He took pity on her bewilderment. He whispered, “Paul just found out. He called me late last night. Just when you write him off as useless, he comes up with something.”

  The next witness, Brandy Taylor, brought a breeze through the door with her, rushed up to the witness stand, and said “Sorry” when she almost tipped over the bottle of water on Nolan’s table.

  Brandy wore a red jacket over a flowing chiffon skirt. Judge Brock gave her his full attention.

  She gave her vital statistics, then began her story, her attitude apologetic. “I didn’t want to complain, but my boyfriend was so upset. He’s a lawyer and he said that it was like a civic duty, that what Ms. Reilly did to us was harmful. We could have died. You know, the truth is, we were all scared.”

  Pushing her gaudy rims up tight to her eyes, Nolan straightened her padded shoulders and brightened all around. She laid on the sympathy lightly, as if knowing a heavy hand might twist things the wrong way. She didn’t say outright, “Poor you,” but a warmth under her questions carried the implication with every sentence. “Tell us, in your own words, Ms. Taylor, what happened.”

  Brandy told the court at great length about their trip to the campground, angling around her troubles with her boyfriend, emphasizing the fun of a visit with her sister, Angel. She said the arguments at the tent next door escalated after Cody Stinson arrived, and she described the arrival of the park ranger and how relieved they felt. Then, she said, they couldn’t sleep anyway. “We got up in the middle of the night to use the-uh-bathroom.”

  “You and your sister both?”

  “We both went, yeah.”

  “Tell us what happened then.”

  “Well, it was super late at night and really dark. Even though the campground’s lit and you can see the lights reflecting on the lake through the trees, it’s not like daytime. On the other hand, it’s not so dark you can’t see. It was also quiet. When we got to the bathroom we waited a minute for this other woman to finish, then we were quick. It was on the way back that I saw Cody Stinson leaving Phoebe’s tent.”

  “Which caused you to consult with Nina Reilly?”

  “That’s right. We were frightened and didn’t know what to do.”

  Brandy wasn’t enjoying this. In spite of Jack’s admonition, Nina scrib
bled on her notepad, the mindless doodles she hoped looked like serious note-taking to anyone who happened to notice. The doodling helped her think, as if the stick figures and their little randomly generated activities freed up her mind for more logical paths.

  She doodled an outhouse with a half-moon cut in the door, a woman walking away, two shadowy figures waiting.

  Hmm, she thought, the woman in the washroom, out and about in the middle of the night. Brandy and Angel had mentioned her on their first visit to Nina. Could that mean anything? The campground had been crowded.

  Could be anyone.

  Could be someone?

  When Brandy got to Cody’s attack, she became teary. Gayle Nolan, entirely pleased with the girl’s performance, egged her on, but Brandy wiped her eyes quickly, saying it was months ago now, and nothing had happened since Stinson was put in jail. She even put a plug in for Paul’s role in Stinson’s capture, which Nina appreciated, even though Jack seemed unmoved.

  Nolan didn’t let Brandy go before detailing the injury to Brandy and her sister. They had been menaced, attacked even, by this man who should never have had the information he had, which came straight out of Nina’s confidential client file.

  When Jack’s turn came to question Brandy, she uncrossed her legs and pushed her back against the chair, as if recoiling from what she expected to be an unpleasant scene. Instead, he gently prodded her about the things Nina had done to prevent any harm the information in the file might have caused.

  “She hired an investigator, who followed you even though you didn’t request protection. He was there when Cody Stinson confronted you at the beach, correct?”

  “That’s right. She didn’t have to do that. I like Ms. Reilly, don’t get me wrong. I know she didn’t mean for us to get hurt.”

  “Would you mind going into a little more detail about what happened when Cody Stinson ‘jumped out’ at you?”

  “Certainly. We were just walking along, and there he was. I recognized him right away and I started screaming and kicking him, because Angel and I have two brothers, and I think it was just a reaction to the situation, you know? Because I recognized him right away. Angel kind of leaped onto his back.”

  “And got knocked down.”

  “Right.”

  “What exactly did Cody Stinson do?”